Alright, so here's a little story before I start. TL;DR will be available below. I was born into a "christian" home. I was christian when I was 6, however, I was converted to Agnosticism when I was 13, March 16th, 2012 to be exact, now I'm 14 and brimming with questions. I attend a christian school currently and I'm picked on by friends for being agnostic, (Great friends, right?). I love to debate Christianity mainly. Now, I've been devoting hours a week to researching and evolution. To some atheist friends, I'm "Brainwashed" to think "Oh, evolution? No evidence. Bad." and "Evolution is false" by the years that its been stuffed into my head. Now, I'm "breaking free" of the "brainwash" I guess you could say.

TL;DR: I'm a X-Christian and I'm 14. I'm trying to become a athiest but I'm having trouble switching from old ways to new, more scientific ways.

Now, I've been researching evolution and I'm asking if anyone has any evolutionary evidence to post it on here and I will look at it. I may be 14, but man, I am ready for some of the most solid proof you got! Being picked on for being agnostic, is really, just making me disapprove of Christians more. Thoughts/Evidence? By the way, I'm not very good with grammar, so if anything was misunderstood just ask and I will be happy to answer it.

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

A few things before I get to the evidence:Atheism and theism are not capitalized, and it's "ei"; not "ie".One cannot "convert" to atheism. Atheism is not a religion.Agnosticism is not a position regarding belief. It refers to lack of knowledge. It'd be like me asking you if you liked my car and you'd say there's a red car next to it. "Agnostic" must always be followed by "atheist" or "theist", depending on the case.

Now then, evolution has been observed. There was an experiment that used bacteria in a medium that had a low concentration of what the bacteria "fed" on and a high concentration of a "useless" material. One of them got lucky and mutated in a way that allowed it to use the "useless" material for "food". Afterward nearly every other bacteria carried the mutation, as it was a beneficial one.There's also DNA similarities, vestigial organs, fossil record... The evidence for evolution is so overwhelming that when people ask me if I "believe" in evolution I feel compelled to ask if they "believe" in the existence of the sun.

A few things before I get to the evidence:Atheism and theism are not capitalized, and it's "ei"; not "ie".One cannot "convert" to atheism. Atheism is not a religion.Agnosticism is not a position regarding belief. It refers to lack of knowledge. It'd be like me asking you if you liked my car and you'd say there's a red car next to it. "Agnostic" must always be followed by "atheist" or "theist", depending on the case.

Now then, evolution has been observed. There was an experiment that used bacteria in a medium that had a low concentration of what the bacteria "fed" on and a high concentration of a "useless" material. One of them got lucky and mutated in a way that allowed it to use the "useless" material for "food". Afterward nearly every other bacteria carried the mutation, as it was a beneficial one.There's also DNA similarities, vestigial organs, fossil record... The evidence for evolution is so overwhelming that when people ask me if I "believe" in evolution I feel compelled to ask if they "believe" in the existence of the sun.

For the grammar mistakes, I apologize. In my original post I pointed out that there would most likely be errors. Anyways, you have a valid point. Lucky, I only have 2 weeks of this hellish-christian school. Ever taken a christian science class? Ha! I started to tell some of my friends about evolution, and they started laughing. I called them ignorant. :p

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Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

"Christian science" is an oxymoron. The Bible has been shown to be wrong on so many things it's not even funny.

Yep, I just sleep in class. They think that since rocks are 75% sedimentary, that the flood happened. I mean, it's not like other floods happened and 70% of the earth is covered in water. I have a tendency to argue a lot of with my christian friends, and I can usually shut them up. My main target and focus is the flood, since christian science relies on it so much.

I hope I do too, I want to be a atheist but like I said, my thought process until recently has been through a "christian standpoint" so I'm knocking that out of my head, slowly.

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Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

I attend a christian school currently ---> TL;DR: I'm a X-Christian and I'm 14. I'm trying to become a athiest but I'm having trouble switching from old ways to new, more scientific ways.

Welcome Dynamic!

I am 17, and also attend a Christian school. It even has Christ in its name. I know first hand how difficult it can be at a religious school whilst being an agnostic/atheist, but luckily my school for some reason is about 60% Atheist at the moment... It is quite amusing.

I hope that the following post gives you a framework to analyse your beliefs in, it's a sort of 'Logic/Rationalism 101', and to understand some of these points is usually fairly important in any debate, whether with yourself or with your brainwashed friends... I took Philosophy to A-Level (I'm a Brit) and I have found that this logical thinking thing can help so much in every occasion. Here's a brief introduction to Rationalism, and again as you said yourself, I'm not an expert so sorry if any of this is wrong!

The main argument for Evolution being true over Design is pretty much that we can show empirically and rationally that evolution is true. Empirical means that we can use evidence to show the conclusion, while rational means that we use logic to show the conclusion.

Religion argues mainly from scripture, which when you look at rationally and in context does not really show much of a conclusion. The problem with religion is that it is not empirical at all. The only evidence that Christians can show is 'religious experiences', Jesus on pieces of toast and miraculous cures for headaches.

Rationally, Evolution by Natural Selection is an observed, verified, tested and scrupulously analysed theory that is accepted as one of the most elegant and graceful theories ever written. Note that in Science, nothing is ever 100% true. This is because of something called an inductive argument.

This is like saying that 'The sun has risen 100,000 times before today, therefore it will rise tomorrow.'. It is never possible to prove any theory completely, and indeed some will argue that the only form of ultimate truth is mathematics, as at any point 2+2 does not equal 3...

A deductive argument is something like 'All Bachelors are Unmarried'. You cannot really find anything deductive through experiencing the world, except definitions and mathematics. A lot of Christians try to define God deductively (i.e. by defining him as perfect and so saying that he must exist because existence is perfect)... This is called the Ontological Argument, and it is a load of bulls**t. I'll let you figure out why. If you can't, look up Kant and Caterus's objections.

If you can use this basic information to help analyse the other posts on Evolution in this thread and it makes sense, you are on the right track.

I hope this helps! Keep in touch, WWGHA is great. I've met some very clever people on here.-EV

I attend a christian school currently ---> TL;DR: I'm a X-Christian and I'm 14. I'm trying to become a athiest but I'm having trouble switching from old ways to new, more scientific ways.

Welcome Dynamic!

I am 17, and also attend a Christian school. It even has Christ in its name. I know first hand how difficult it can be at a religious school whilst being an agnostic/atheist, but luckily my school for some reason is about 60% Atheist at the moment... It is quite amusing.

I hope that the following post gives you a framework to analyse your beliefs in, it's a sort of 'Logic/Rationalism 101', and to understand some of these points is usually fairly important in any debate, whether with yourself or with your brainwashed friends... I took Philosophy to A-Level (I'm a Brit) and I have found that this logical thinking thing can help so much in every occasion. Here's a brief introduction to Rationalism, and again as you said yourself, I'm not an expert so sorry if any of this is wrong!

The main argument for Evolution being true over Design is pretty much that we can show empirically and rationally that evolution is true. Empirical means that we can use evidence to show the conclusion, while rational means that we use logic to show the conclusion.

Religion argues mainly from scripture, which when you look at rationally and in context does not really show much of a conclusion. The problem with religion is that it is not empirical at all. The only evidence that Christians can show is 'religious experiences', Jesus on pieces of toast and miraculous cures for headaches.

Rationally, Evolution by Natural Selection is an observed, verified, tested and scrupulously analysed theory that is accepted as one of the most elegant and graceful theories ever written. Note that in Science, nothing is ever 100% true. This is because of something called an inductive argument.

This is like saying that 'The sun has risen 100,000 times before today, therefore it will rise tomorrow.'. It is never possible to prove any theory completely, and indeed some will argue that the only form of ultimate truth is mathematics, as at any point 2+2 does not equal 3...

If you can use this information to help analyse the other posts on this thread and it makes sense, you are on the right track.

I hope this helps! Keep in touch -EV

My school has Christ in its name too. You and I can see we can relate very well. I find it funny, I would have continued to have been christian unless I took a step back and thought what I believe in. I think there was a study on that religion is less abundant in people who actually think through situations? In Christianity I found too much BS: A global flood? Slaughter of thousands? Walking on water? It also sounds like much of it is called off of Mithraism (Persian religion, pre-dates Christianity and has a the main frame of it as well)

I appreciate the help

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Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

[.....] Considering that the minimum amount of water that would be necessary for the Great Flood, 840,730,240,000,000,000,000 gallons, and considering that on the planet there is 332,500,000 cubic miles of water in total, which is 366,121,451,520,000,000,000 gallons, one can see that there is some disparity of numbers. The amount of water required for the flood would require 2.2963 times the amount of water found on our planet, and that's in addition to the planetary H2O total (since a flood would require water on top of the already existing water), for a total of a staggering 1,206,851,691,520,000,000,000 gallons of water total, or 3.2963 times the actual amount of water. I hereby submit for your approval that, using mathematics, we can actually entirely scientifically disprove the story of Noah's Flood. I'll never say I hate math again.

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"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative."

My school has Christ in its name too. You and I can see we can relate very well.

Haha! Maybe so. I am a classical Violist, so I think your profile picture may cause us to disagree on that matter but yes, I have probably been through what you are going through now, except I deconverted from Judaism, not Christianity.

I find it funny, I would have continued to have been christian unless I took a step back and thought what I believe in. I think there was a study on that religion is less abundant in people who actually think through situations? In Christianity I found too much BS: A global flood? Slaughter of thousands? Walking on water? It also sounds like much of it is called off of Mithraism (Persian religion, pre-dates Christianity and has a the main frame of it as well)

You do actually seem to have a lot more ability to self-assess than a lot of adults. It's very refreshing to see a 14 year old who can actually think for themselves. You self-analyse very well, it is a rather ridiculous set of stories. Have you ever read the less savoury parts of the Bible? There are many MANY ridiculous parts, such as teachings prohibiting women from speaking in church, commandments to stone your children if they disobey you, advocation of rape, genocide, murder, slavery and Darwin only knows what else.

My favourite passage is the one where God sends two bears to rip apart 42 children for teasing a man with a bald head. That's a cracker of a story. try 2 Kings 2 for that bit.

This site also has a MASSIVE comprehensive list of Biblical inconsistencies. Such as Joseph allegedly having two different fathers. Have a read through the list contradictions... It is rather funny. And makes you realise that a perfect being couldn't have written such a ridiculously inconsistent book.http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/donald_morgan/inconsistencies.html

Not a problem, young apprentice. I got the same warm welcome when I joined this forum looking for answers, I appreciated the help I got as well. It is my duty to pass on only but part of the knowledge of our beloved forum. There are people FAR cleverer than I on here.

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"Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative."

[.....] Considering that the minimum amount of water that would be necessary for the Great Flood, 840,730,240,000,000,000,000 gallons, and considering that on the planet there is 332,500,000 cubic miles of water in total, which is 366,121,451,520,000,000,000 gallons, one can see that there is some disparity of numbers. The amount of water required for the flood would require 2.2963 times the amount of water found on our planet, and that's in addition to the planetary H2O total (since a flood would require water on top of the already existing water), for a total of a staggering 1,206,851,691,520,000,000,000 gallons of water total, or 3.2963 times the actual amount of water. I hereby submit for your approval that, using mathematics, we can actually entirely scientifically disprove the story of Noah's Flood. I'll never say I hate math again.

Yeah, I asked them and they said something along the lines of the water is under the earth. My response: Then where is the water under the crust? Is there a giant lake underground? I mean, It's 3 times the current amount of water on the earth." Their response: Uhh..

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Haha! Maybe so. I am a classical Violist, so I think your profile picture may cause us to disagree on that matter but yes, I have probably been through what you are going through now, except I deconverted from Judaism, not Christianity.

Meh, I'm currently listening to dubstep. But hey, we're all different, no? I also find it funny how christians at my school say "thats jewish". Me and my friend, always responde with "You know Jesus was Jewish, correct?" They mostly ignored me.

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You do actually seem to have a lot more ability to self-assess than a lot of adults. It's very refreshing to see a 14 year old who can actually think for themselves. You self-analyse very well, it is a rather ridiculous set of stories. Have you ever read the less savoury parts of the Bible? There are many MANY ridiculous parts, such as teachings prohibiting women from speaking in church, commandments to stone your children if they disobey you, advocation of rape, genocide, murder, slavery and Darwin only knows what else.

Well, I always thought I had a more different thought process then everyone and I thought I was different. Anyways, my friends as I *think* said in a earlier post, laugh at me when I start explaining evolution. I'm starting to wonder if these are real "friends" Lucky, only 2 weeks of school left. My intentions right now is to leave a big ^(-_-)^ to everyone as I walk out of that hell-hole for the last time,

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Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

Before I present (only some of) the evidence for evolution, I want to make sure we're on the same page as to what evolution actually is. A lot of theists who visit this forum have very wrong ideas of evolution and what evolutionary theory predicts. Thus, they have a hard time accepting the proof that actually exists: it doesn't fit their preconceptions.

So forgive me if I go over some basics. First, biological evolution as it's more-or-less understood:

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Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations

Major changes generally, especially for larger, more complex organisms like vertebrates (including us humans) take multiple millions of years to occur. Because such change is so gradual, it's difficult to perceive directly. But nonetheless it can be shown to happen, and evolution is one of the better-proven concepts in modern science.

For starters, here are some well-known fossil lineages showing how horses, humans, whales and other animals have evolved into their present forms: http://transitionalfossils.com/

Wow! I kinda thought the forum was inactive a bit from a first glance, I've been proved wrong. Thanks for the welcomes. Oh, I need heavy artillery. I have checked out Kcradys posts, I will go check them so more in a second.

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Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

This is one of my favourite Kenneth Miller lectures and I've linked it here before. It's a lecture on evolution vs intelligent design. There's a good deal of good information as well but it is a time-consuming sit at about 2 hours. Worth it though.

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"I drank what?!"- Socrates

"Dying for something when you know you'll be resurrected is not a sacrifice.It's a parlour trick."- an aquaintance

Philip of Macedon: (via messenger) If we enter Sparta, we will raze all your buildings and ravage all your women.Spartan Reply: If.

Wow! I kinda thought the forum was inactive a bit from a first glance, I've been proved wrong. Thanks for the welcomes. Oh, I need heavy artillery. I have checked out Kcradys posts, I will go check them so more in a second.

Some of it is heavy, but it will give you a whole new perspective. It did to me, and I was already a hardcore atheist.

Some of it is heavy, but it will give you a whole new perspective. It did to me, and I was already a hardcore atheist.

I read part of it, I was blown away! By the way,

Anyone have methods for debating with Christians? The ignorance is astounding. Here is a snippet from a argument today with a christian I had today.

Me: How did the ark fit the 1mil+ species of animals on the ark today?Them: Well, maybe there was one basic frog on the ark and it became more species by breeding. (They used crossbreeding as a example)Me: That's evolutionThem: No its not!Me: Yes, it isn't.Them: NO IT ISNT!Me: You are very ignorant, I can tell.

By the way, if anyone thinking about these arguments I had today with Christians. Here's the situation: So I missed school on Monday 5/7/2012. I came back, and two of my "christian friends" had spread a false rumor that was I'm atheist. My problems with it1. Not officially atheist yet2. They were stretching the truth quite a bit3. You're supposed to let ME tell my friends and other people on MY OWN TIME

So, after my "christian science" test in 3rd period, I wrote a 2 page argument thing (Can type it up, if you really want it, thought 1/4 of it is directed towards the two "friends") And at lunch we had a 30 minute debate on it.

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Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

Well I see I'm late to the party, as the links I thought of have already been offered. Did I miss someone suggesting Richard Dawkin's book, "The Greatest Show on Earth" and "The God Delusion"? If you have an e-reader, perhaps you can download them and read them without worry about the cover giving you away.

Until you have a good enough grasp on the science of evolution, you might want to stick with questions instead. When your classmates try to explain something to you, ask how that works, what's the process behind it, how do they know? That last one, how do you know, is going to trip them up because ultimately the answer is the bible faith. Familiarize yourself with critical thinking skills (God is Imaginary illustrates a nice approach).

You remind me of my son - confident and hungry for real knowledge. He lost his faith at around age 13. It took a few years for the logic that caught his attention to get through my own thick skill and I found freedom in reality next. Good for you, and I hope your parents aren't giving you too hard a time about this.

Good for you, and I hope your parents aren't giving you too hard a time about this.

Haven't told them yet :/ My mother is a christian. Divorced parents. Don't really know about my dad. He claimed he was christian but I heard him stay stuff like "If there really is a god" and "your religion is very important too you" (When i was christian)

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Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

Haven't told them yet :/ My mother is a christian. Divorced parents. Don't really know about my dad. He claimed he was christian but I heard him stay stuff like "If there really is a god" and "your religion is very important too you" (When i was christian)

My mother was proud of me for making my own decision when I told her I was deconverting from Judaism. I was genuinely quite emotional when she told me that.

Some parents will accept it, others think you go to hell. That's just how it washes, but you'll be alright because hell doesn't exist.

If you need to talk to someone who isn't Christian, totally impartial and around your age, you can reach me by PM at most points in the day, or by email! I've been through this all before, as have many MANY of the people on here.

And regarding the forum being inactive, a little wrong there! Most of us just sit hitting F5 and wait for the 'Show new replies' tab to pop up...

Anyone have methods for debating with Christians? The ignorance is astounding. Here is a snippet from a argument today with a christian I had today.

Me: How did the ark fit the 1mil+ species of animals on the ark today?Them: Well, maybe there was one basic frog on the ark and it became more species by breeding. (They used crossbreeding as a example)Me: That's evolutionThem: No its not!Me: Yes, it isn't.Them: NO IT ISNT!Me: You are very ignorant, I can tell.

You seem to be doing fine, it's just that it is difficult do break down such walls.

This is understandably a very frequent topic of discussion here. Here is a grand problem with the ark situation. With all of that water (8.4 x 1020 gallons), the chemistry of the water would be altered. Animals that live in can survive only in salt or fresh water would be wiped out. Even those that can adapt between them would be wiped out due to decreased oxygen levels, increased water pressure, and decreased sunlight marine vegetation to die. This poses a problem for Noah, as he has to accommodate 1 (or 7) pairs of blue whales, in addition to all other forms of marine life, many of which rely on specific niches and habitats for survival, such as a coral reef or deep sea vent. Noah would have to have an aquarium on board the ark capable of recreating all of those individual niches, in addition to housing around 250,000 marine species. That's not even counting the land animals yet, including the 400,000 + species of beetle, 62 species of deer, 260 species of monkey, 9,400 species of reptile, etc etc, not to mention all of the food and waste management required for that.

It also doesn't account for how Noah would have gotten these species, when he was unaware of, at the very least, 4 of the continents, and furthermore, how those species would have gotten back. Somehow, Noah, a really old drunken slob, managed to get to the Everglades to fetch a North American Alligator, and did so without a rifle or tranquilizer gun, or modern reptile long distance transportation methods, and without Steve Irwin, and then got it back to the middle east. Honestly, you could probably find an infinite number of problems regarding just the ark and the amount of life needed to be preserved in order to explain the current biological populations of our Earth.

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So, after my "christian science" test in 3rd period, I wrote a 2 page argument thing (Can type it up, if you really want it, thought 1/4 of it is directed towards the two "friends") And at lunch we had a 30 minute debate on it.

I hope I do too, I want to be a atheist but like I said, my thought process until recently has been through a "christian standpoint" so I'm knocking that out of my head, slowly.

First, Hello Dynamic, welcome. Secondly, i have never tried to "become an atheist." I have been very much focused on reason and logic, trying to make sense of things and i've been trying to understand religious beliefs. I've come to realize i'm an atheist around the age 23, but i've always been questioning it long before. I can assure you that you've come to the right place to help solve some questions you might have. We're very much willing to help.

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Me:What are you looking at Eminem?Brother: Nothing, Harry Potter.

I love to read books, just not your Bible. i support gay rights and women's rights. Why? Because i'm tired of the hate, stupidity, and your desire to control us all and make up lies.

Yeah, I asked them and they said something along the lines of the water is under the earth. My response: Then where is the water under the crust? Is there a giant lake underground? I mean, It's 3 times the current amount of water on the earth." Their response: Uhh..

You've stumped them. sometimes some theists would try to weasel their way around and say "it's magic" or that "God works mysteriously so we cannot know with our puny three pound brain."

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Meh, I'm currently listening to dubstep. But hey, we're all different, no? I also find it funny how christians at my school say "thats jewish". Me and my friend, always responde with "You know Jesus was Jewish, correct?" They mostly ignored me.

Often times it just shows that they hadn't really thought about their religion deeply enough, they just qoute the scriptures.

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Well, I always thought I had a more different thought process then everyone and I thought I was different. Anyways, my friends as I *think* said in a earlier post, laugh at me when I start explaining evolution. I'm starting to wonder if these are real "friends" Lucky, only 2 weeks of school left. My intentions right now is to leave a big ^(-_-)^ to everyone as I walk out of that hell-hole for the last time,

wow. Well i wouldn't consider them friends myself. I can understand that. Even though i never went to a religious school, often times i felt like ^(-_-)^ at mine as well. i hardly ever had friends there. But back on topic, you are very much likely to fit in here as i did.

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Me:What are you looking at Eminem?Brother: Nothing, Harry Potter.

I love to read books, just not your Bible. i support gay rights and women's rights. Why? Because i'm tired of the hate, stupidity, and your desire to control us all and make up lies.

Wow! I kinda thought the forum was inactive a bit from a first glance, I've been proved wrong. Thanks for the welcomes. Oh, I need heavy artillery. I have checked out Kcradys posts, I will go check them so more in a second.

Some of it is heavy, but it will give you a whole new perspective. It did to me, and I was already a hardcore atheist.

this site made me a hardcore atheist as well.

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Me:What are you looking at Eminem?Brother: Nothing, Harry Potter.

I love to read books, just not your Bible. i support gay rights and women's rights. Why? Because i'm tired of the hate, stupidity, and your desire to control us all and make up lies.